Samsung has released its latest flagship tablet, the Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra, a pricey but high-powered Android device geared towards prosumers and professionals alike.
For most people, tablets equate to convenience: the form factor lends itself to most users’ lifestyles, they’re lightweight, versatile, and can be controlled with nothing but your hands. The Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra is all of these things and comfortably goes up against Apple’s iPad Pro with premium features that include a huge 14.6” screen, up to 16GB RAM and 1TB of storage, and a seemingly never-ending 11,200mAh battery. As tablets have become more powerful and manufacturers have begun marketing their higher-end devices as laptop replacers, where does Samsung’s latest offering sit?
Depending on how you look at it, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra can be either or both of the above. Its huge 14.6” Dynamic AMOLED 2X display makes it just home in your tote bag as it does on your desk, but – given this is bigger than many laptop screens – portability may be an issue for some. The tablet is surprisingly thin, however, measuring a mere 5.5mm at its thickest point – thinner than the equivalent model from Apple, but slightly heavier at 737g. Inside you will find the latest processor from industry-leaders Qualcomm, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy, the same found in Samsung’s flagship phones – the two brands have shared a long-term partnership and the name of this processor (with the inclusion of “for Galaxy”) suggests it has been optimized for this tablet.
Not much has changed in terms of design – the S9 Ultra looks incredibly similar to last year’s S8 Ultra. The changes are primarily in the hardware and include a new vapor chamber cooling system that has been custom engineered for higher performance, allowing multi-tasking and other high-intensity workflows to be handled with ease. This together with the upgraded processor makes the S9 Ultra an incredibly versatile device: in our testing, it handled heavy applications like Adobe’s Premiere Pro easily, allowing for a very smooth video editing experience on the go. It’s also a highly capable mobile gaming device and was not only able to handle all of the popular gaming titles we tried from the Google Play store (including Fortnite and Call of Duty: Mobile), but game system emulation up to the Nintendo Switch was possible (Switch games that played flawlessly included Mario Kart 8 and Super Mario 3D World, but others that required more processing power such as the latest Zelda did not. Older-gen systems up until Dreamcast were overall playable without issue).
Nintendo Switch played on a Samsung tablet with an Xbox controller? Not something you see every day.
The sound system has seen an upgrade, too, with the return of the AKG-developed quad speaker set-up – this time, though, they’re 20% larger, a significant increase that is audibly noticeable without impacting the form factor. The S9 Ultra is also – for the first time – IP68 rated, meaning it is both dust and water-resistant with the ability to withstand being continuously submerged in water for up to 30 minutes (the accompanying S Pen – which comes in the box – shares this IP68 rating). In terms of security, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra offers both face and fingerprint identification, whereas in comparison the iPad Pro only offer the former of the two.
Speaking of what comes in the box, other than the included S Pen stylus all you will find is a USB Type-C cable – there’s no charging brick, which may irk some people, but when you consider that Apple sells its own stylus separately for $129 USD, it kind of works out. A plethora of additional accessories are available with the (quite pricey) Book Cover Keyboard with Trackpad being the standout.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra starts at $1199.99 USD / £1,199.00 GBP for the base model and tops out at $1619.99 USD / £1,699.00 GBP. It’s important to note that the US version of the tablet only offers Wi-Fi connectivity – the cellular version with 5G is unavailable in the US at the time of writing, but can be found in other markets including the UK and Europe.
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